Evacuation would constitute U.S. "complicity in genocide"- Prof Boyle

[TamilNet, Tuesday, 10 March 2009, 05:59 GMT]"For the United States government to "evacuate" Tamils from Vanni and then turn them over to the genocidal Government of Sri Lanka would constitute "Complicity in genocide" by the United States to the genocide that GOSL is currently inflicting on the Tamils in violation of Genocide Convention Article III (e) and the United States's own Genocide Convention Implementation Act as amended. Such a turn-over could very well create personal criminal responsibility for United States government officials involved in this process under both international criminal law and United States domestic criminal law," warns Prof. Boyle, an expert in international law and a professor at University of Illinois College of Law.

Professor Francis Boyle, professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law.

In a note sent to TamilNet, Prof Boyle adds: "The United States government is a party to the 1948 Genocide Convention, which has been implemented as internal United States domestic criminal law by means of the Genocide Convention Implementation Act as currently amended. Article III (e) of the Genocide Convention prohibited, criminalized and requires the punishment of "Complicity in genocide.""

Note that the 2007 Genocide Accountability Act (GAA) amended the Genocide Convention Implementation Act of 1987 signed by President Ronald Reagan.

An article that appeared in Telegraph edition of 8th March said that "[t]he Obama administration will sound out foreign secretary Shiv Shankar Menon on Monday on India’s support for a US-led invasion of Sri Lanka to evacuate nearly 200,000 Tamil civilians trapped inside territory controlled by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam with precariously declining stocks of food or medicine.

"“We had some people there to look at the situation to identify what the possibilities might be. We would do whatever we can to help these people,” assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asian affairs Richard Boucher told a group of South Asian journalists yesterday," the Telegraph report added.